Why did things go so terribly wrong with Tarantino?

one-dimensional characterizations HOW SO?

no plot UM, YES THERE IS, IT'S ABOUT THE BRIDE GETTING REVENGE, PRETTY OBVIOUS IF YOU THINK ABOUT IT

actually this is true of all fincher's films!!

i ages ago had an idea to do a piece about RESERVOIR DOGS and SCOTT OF THE ANTARCTIC as MORE SIMILAR THAN YOU THINK

but it has run into the sand = merely turned into a lonely post on a message board

xpost

-- kate/thank you friendly cloud (kat...), March 9th, 2005.

i love his movies but i have to agree with you there.

Kill Bill is QT's only 'epic' film - on that basis you might expect the others to get accused of having no plot before it. but they all have tangents and intricacies within a simple premise - he juggles well.

I think he ran out of idea after "Pulp Fiction", myself.

haha does this emotional response actually EXIST dog latin!? (oh no! my false memory of this experience trumps the actual real repeat experience! oh NO!!)

i kinda hope it does

You have opened a MASSIVE box of contention here.

xpost

i doubt it, actually

It'd be okay if he came up with some original ideas instead of these homages to obscure films that he obviously hopes will give him some kind of hip street cred or something.

i can't see why 'original ideas' is automatically better than magazinesque homage.

Not quite the same. Godard said something about the human condition other than "look at all the movies I've seen".

xpost

i can't see why 'original ideas' is automatically better than magazinesque homage

Because the former is the goal of art and the latter is pointless.

i don't agree at all really - surely 'original ideas' are the critic's goal more than the artist's. homage is crucial to both practices.

Homage is for the critics, originality is for the artist.

xxpost

I keeny await momus' contribution to this thread ;)

i could be totally wrong about this as i haven't seen kill bill.

and yet somehow it did, extraordinary!

It was without charm.

i found all the scenes between Beatrix and Bill quite charming - his devilish charisma, her quiet awe mixed with occasional sass, wry suspicion, and the slightest hint of FEAR - all conveyed very well, good chemistry backed with some dialogue exchanges as good as any from his other films

i found it remarkable in it's playfulness, tho often cringingly trite ("you know for minute there...i did..." - yet somehow it's not really a problem), happily surrendering to cliche (often his own, often from myriad other genres and algorithms) at times, eschewing it vehemently at others - mostly it is cute, often hilarious stuff (how can you not love the audacity and whim of The Bride telling the young kid to stop hanging with the yakuza and go home to his mother?)

Even at the end as she kills Bill, he's made to utter some preposterous expository line about how the karate master must have taught her the special manoeuvre that kills him.

i DID have a bit of a problem with this i must admit, but more for the nature of the situation not the dialogue (it being such a bizarre situation, sticking to simple lines one could understand easily was perhaps the best option)

(and that karate master was such an utterly lame cliché of a character.)

no less entertaining for it, but i'd say 'extreme' rather than 'lame'

The movie was so boring. Every scene went on for twice the length it should have, it had zero sense of pace. The tangents it went off in led nowhere, they were just stitched in there for no good reason except that he'd filmed them. If there's any director in need of a good editor, by Christ it's Tarantino.

purely objective flailing. the tangents/flashbacks i liked as punctuation - the anime sequence (unoriginal instyle, not that this is a criticism, but original in deployment) for example - but this was more about fucking around with genre and order as with all his other work.

my only vague criticism: it wasn't Dadaist enough (at all?)

it's hardly QT's fault no one else has picked this ball up and run w.it

Similarly, films don't necessarily need a strong plot if the focus is elsewhere. But if it's essentially a plot-driven film... There were one or two good scenes - I liked the one when Uma's fighting some girl-assassin and the girl-assassin's kid comes home. There's some tension in the juxtaposition of the revenge killing and the domestic scene. But such interesting tensions were very few and far between.

"Once Upon a Time in Nazi-Occupied France" sounds awesome.

war flick and tarantino sounds awesome, and back to the days of less pulp and more fiction.maybe.

more reservoir, less dogs

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076584/

???

it's the original, but i was reading trantino wrote onle a loose adaptation of it

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061578/

???

Of those rooting for Quentin Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds" on Oscar night, the Torgan family might be cheering the loudest.

As the proprietors of the New Beverly Cinema, the Torgans operate one of Los Angeles' last havens for classic movies. And, as of recently, Tarantino is their landlord.

The New Beverly has been the Torgan family business since 1978. But if not for the intervention of the director with the encyclopedic knowledge of film, it would be just another chain franchise.

"It was going to be turned into a Super Cuts," Tarantino said. "I'd been coming to the New Beverly ever since I was old enough to drive there from the South Bay -- since about 1982. So, I couldn't let that happen."

Built in 1929 as a first-run moviehouse, the Torgan family moved into the property and turned it into a 200-seat venue for classic, independent and foreign films. One glance at a recent New Beverly schedule leaves no doubt about what attracted Tarantino to the place -- John Wayne's "True Grit" one night, Lars Von Trier's "Antichrist" later that week. The "New Bev" hosts animation events, celebrity-programmed fests and a bimonthly, exploitation-fueled Grindhouse.

The theater on Beverly a block west of La Brea hit hard times in the mid-2000s as the DVD market chewed into ticket sales. Sherman Torgan, the family patriarch and the operator of the theater, was facing serious financial troubles.

"Since I'm a print collector and I screen movies at my home, I heard from other collectors and projectionists that Sherman might have to close down," Tarantino recalled. The director got in touch and asked Torgan how much money he needed a month to keep up the theater.

"The answer was about $5,000," Tarantino said. "So, I just started paying him that per month. I considered it a contribution to cinema."

Then Torgan passed away unexpectedly in 2007, leaving his family and friends of the New Beverly in mourning -- and the future of the theater in doubt.

"Within a week of my father's death, the landlord had a buyer bidding for the theater space," said Michael Torgan, Sherman's son. "Fortunately, I found a copy of our original lease, and it said that the family had the right of first refusal if we could find another buyer."

Desperate to prevent the loss of the family business, the Torgans began considering all options.

"My father had just died, so it wasn't a good time for our family," Michael recalled. "Now, we thought we might lose the theater. My mother reached out to Quentin and explained to him that we were in trouble."

Tarantino decided to buy the space outright.

"I always considered the New Beverly my charity -- an investment I never wanted back," he said. "I already had a good relationship with the family and the theater, so it was a natural step."
The purchase, though, was not a smooth process. According to Torgan, the original landlord and prospective buyer moved to block Tarantino's bid. The sides haggled for months, but eventually a deal paved the way for a buyout. (A nondisclosure agreement prevents the Torgans or Tarantino from revealing the purchase price or the identity of the former landlord.)

Tarantino is now the owner, but he allows Michael and his family to run the theater's daily operations -- with his occasional input.

"Quentin couldn't be a better landlord," Torgan said. "He's involved with suggesting movies when he likes, but he lets us do most of the booking."

Tarantino recently organized an Angela Mao kung fu night featuring "Return of the Tiger" and "Stoner" as well as an "all blood" night with "Blood Spattered Bride" and "Asylum of Blood."

"I can make programming suggestions when I want to," Tarantino said. "It is cool to have a theater that I can use to show what I like."

Tarantino held his "Inglourious Basterds" DVD screening event at the New Beverly. And he will welcome guest programmer Jason Reitman, a pal from this year's awards circuit, to the theater Friday for six days of Reitman's favorites.

Since taking over the property, Tarantino has made it possible for the New Beverly to undergo some badly needed renovations such as new light fixtures and seats and a digital projection system. But he doesn't want the place to change too much. The 35mm projector is still the preferred screening method, popcorn and sodas remain cheap -- and the Torgans are still in charge, with an Oscar-winning angel over their shoulder.

"As long as I'm alive, and as long as I'm rich, the New Beverly will be there, showing double features in 35mm," Tarantino said.

that is great.

not a fan but this is very cool of him

i remember reading a while back about some dvds, old obscure films that qt had overseen the release of - does anyone know what these were?

iirc miramax was putting out a line of og 70s grindhouse films. not sure if it actually happened.

not sure it got much beyond this dvd release of jack hill's great SWITCHBLADE SISTERS - includes a pretty entertaining commentary by jack and quentin

http://www.tarantino.info/wiki/index.php/Switchblade_Sisters

looks like there were quite a few - thanks.

http://www.tarantino.info/wiki/index.php/Category:Rolling_Thunder_Pictures

much thx to dude for buying the new bev btw

http://www.vanityfair.com/online/oscars/2010/02/cinema-tarantino-quentin-saves-the-art-house.html

yeah, dude is an american hero just for saving the new beverly. seriously in the top 10 reasons for me to move back to LA.

lol

may 14

* Pulp Fiction (1994)
Midnight (11:59 p.m.) - all seats $7

he's already tilted the programming toward schlock/horror a bit but he's not overdoing it *yet*

oops didn't see the writeup upthread either. pasadena alone had lost two great revival houses in the last 10 yrs but i didn't know new bev was the last full time one

Courtney Love's Jew Loan Officer (Shakey Mo Collier) wrote this on thread Tarantino Poll on board I Love Everything on Feb 10, 2009

True Romance doesn't belong on this poll for the same reason Natural Born Killers, From Dusk Til Dawn, Mr. Destiny Turns On the Radio, and whatever else don't belong on it

Shakey Mo Collier wrote this on thread Now is the time where you come anticipate GRINDHOUSE with me on board I Love Everything on Apr 12, 2007

I like Tarantino (as a director - stay off the screen please Mr. Destiny Turns On the Radio), I'm more of a Rodriguez hater.
Shakey Mo Collier wrote this on thread Why did things go so terribly wrong with Tarantino? on board I Love Everything on Mar 10, 2005

Morby Tarantino's most notable failures are not his directorial ones (I've never seen Four Rooms) - and that stuff seems to be sorta inconsequential when discussing his film work. I mean are we gonna run down "Mr. Destiny Turns On the Radio" (or whatever it was called?) what's the point? No one cares or vouches for Tarantino's acting or scripting skills - tho I do love Natural Born Killers - its the actual movies he's directed we're interested in...

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f3/Mr_destiny.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1b/Destiny_Turns_on_the_Radio.jpg

It's cool. I can see how you got confused.

is that the one where he did the Top Gun porn monologue?

weird club girl ducklips on QT there

xp: I remember nothing about either of those movies!

He reminds me a little of French Stewart there.

Tarantino's main problem is that his movies faithfully reflect his talents as a moviemaker. The best directors know how to collaborate with dozens of people whose talents complement or exceed their own, while they provide guidance and a unifying vision to that ensemble. Tarantino thinks the best possible Tarantino movie is one that has the largest possible dose of Tarantino in it.

his main problem in "going wrong" is similar to George Lucas's: his "great" stuff was not great.

Maybe that has some connection to their talents as moviemakers?

Hack

tarantino owns

...if you have a particular passion for feet. But I suppose that goes without saying.

as a stylist, he's a regular Glenn Greenwald

I left Pulp Fiction w/the same feeling in my gut as one has after drunkenly scarfing a Big Mac

Kill Bills were OK mit out sound

He's unrelentingly derivative and not synthetically imaginative enough to make me ever care

as a stylist, he's a regular Glenn Greenwald

― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Thursday, February 9, 2012 4:17 PM (7 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^Ha! Yes.

the greatest filmmaker of his generation, i think we can at least agree on that much.

Of his generation where?

A lot of his movies are fun, but whenever his characters start going into a lengthy signature Tarantino monologue/dialogue all I hear is a muted trombone.

For dudes who hate derivative stuff, you sure do enjoy having the same conversation over and over again.

bang

that's the sound of a truth bomb

thread is now an action thread imo

Better wipe that blood off and wield my katana. Who the fuck stylist chose yellow for my track suit, tho?

Bruce Lee's.

See?

Tarantino is at his best when he's being derivative.

Jim Belushit sure likes to be in movies about destiny, I guess.

my favorite tarantino clip of all time might just be this one him talking about blaxploitation and the crips pic.twitter.com/ogpOa9pwzr

— robert franco (@responsiblerob) March 25, 2019

i finally get it now. he's a coked out 10-year-old.

Is this the 'Once Upon A Time In Hollywood' thread?

No. Quentin Tarantino's Manson murders movie